Wednesday, January 25, 2012

For The Love Of Office Supplies ...

I have always loved school supplies.

When I was younger and my mom would haul me with her to the pharmacy where she paid our electric bill – and perhaps picked up prescriptions, too – I was allowed to wander down the school supply aisle because it was in line with the service window, so she was able to keep an eye on me.

I was in my heaven among the Pink Pearl erasers and translucent rulers and spiral-bound notebooks, the bane of teachers everywhere. Pencil boxes and markers – oh, markers – and folders and packs of loose-leaf paper. And the piece de resistance, the box of 64 crayons with the sharpener built in.

Heaven, I tell you. Heaven.

And sometimes, my dad would take me to the stationery store when he had to pick up a new rubber stamp for his business. I remember the day I discovered larger binder rings. He bought a few of them for me. They made excellent bracelets.

To this day, I'm plenty happy to wander around an office-supply store. Sometimes, I even need to buy something. My relationship with binder clips is well known to many. (Doesn't everyone have four sizes on hand?)

The store I frequent most frequently begins with an Office and ends with a Depot. And recently, the location I frequent most frequently moved. From next door to the Bed Bath & Beyond to the space formerly occupied by Barnes & Noble.

The new location is carpeted. It feels wrong.

And now I have to learn the new layout. I used to know right where I was headed when I actually needed something, but now, oh, nothing where it's supposed to be.

But I was there the other day because I needed to buy some shipping boxes. I spied the shipping supply section. Labels. Tape. Bubble mailers. Tubes. Clasp envelopes. But nary a box. Seriously? Could they only be had online? Crap.

But no. I found them. All the way at the back of the store. Which made no sense. But fine. I grabbed four 6x6x6 boxes in their flattened state, $1.49 each. Six bucks for four boxes. That seemed kind of silly.

Then I remembered that I needed jewel cases. (Yes, I still use them sometimes.) I found my way to them and was reaching for a 50-pack for $16 and change when I spied a 30-pack for ... $7.59.

Now, math was not my best subject in school, but I did OK on my 2s when I learned multiplication.

$7.59 x 2 = $15.18

and

30 x 2 = 60

Huh. Ten more cases for less money?

I didn't need 50 anyway. So I grabbed a 30-pack and headed for the checkout, still thinking that $6 seemed like a lot of money to spend for four boxes, but c'est la vie.

At home, though, I looked for them online. Uline sells boxes.

Do you know what Uline charges for a 6x6x6 box? $0.26. Yeah, that's right: 26 cents.

Granted, I have to buy at least 25 of 'em.

But do you know what 25 x $0.26 is?

$6.50.

So, yeah, Office Depot won't be seeing any future box-buying business from me.

I requested a Uline catalog today. It's available online, but I still like printed pieces. I am more than a little giddy at the thought of ordering mailing tubes for shipping sleeves of cookies. And boxes in assorted sizes. And bubble mailers.